Linnworks now supports the ability to add more than one bin location to an item, within a single warehouse. Having previously identified that it is incredibly difficult for eCommerce businesses to efficiently manage their inventory when being restricted to only one bin location per item, per warehouse, we have introduced new functionality that will allow you to overcome this common inventory management challenge.

The ability to assign a single inventory item to multiple bins is important for a number of reasons. Firstly, it allows you make more efficient use of your warehouse space, which becomes even more important as you scale your business.

Secondly, it enables you to strategically store your inventory to speed up your picking and packing process. As an example, for fast-selling items you may want to have a certain amount located in closer proximity to your picking and packing team, and more specifically to the delivery van. Depending on the total quantity you have in stock, it may not be feasible, however, to have all of it stored in the same place, which is where the ability to have multiple bin locations becomes important.

Ultimately, it helps to increase the efficiency of your team, while avoiding confusion and errors when managing inventory and order processing.

SEE ALSO: 4 Strategies For Saving Time & Increasing Business Efficiency

What multiple bin locations means for your business.

In addition to the advantages outlined above, there are other benefits to using multiple bin locations:

Quicker Order Processing.

Again, the ability to pick and pack orders at a faster speed is a huge benefit to the efficiency of your warehouse operations. By reducing the time needed for your employees to travel around the warehouse, productivity levels will increase and you can process more orders at a quicker rate.

No need for external processes.

Multiple bin locations reduces the need to use an external warehouse management system or an external spreadsheet to manage your inventory located in different areas of your warehouse.

Reduced risk of damage.

By storing an individual item across multiple bins within a warehouse, you reduce the chance of your entire stock for that item being damaged in the event of a warehouse fire or flooding.

SEE ALSO: Inventory Management Techniques

Supports inventory method First In First Out (FIFO).

Should you wish to use First In First Out to reduce obsolete inventory and more accurately determine your stock value, you can now do so with both multiple bin locations and our batch tracking functionality.

How multiple bin locations work within Linnworks.

Whether you’re an existing customer or are thinking of using Linnworks, you will now be able to add locations entries within the system, meaning you can store batched items within different bins/racks in the same location.

This is a major feature missing within many inventory management systems, which is subsequently a huge limitation for many online sellers. It does, however, add a more complex layer to the Linnworks system and we would therefore recommend that you only utilize this functionality if necessary.

In addition to adding support for multiple bin locations within Linnworks, we now also support the ability to use the First In First Out (FIFO) inventory method, track the expiry dates of your products and assign batches to products.

For more information about Linnworks’ new Multiple Bin Location functionality, you can view the documentation here.

This release is part of a much larger update to our inventory functionality. We would also recommend watching the video below to learn more.